


My Dear George

by Beefmaster



Category: Ghosts (TV 2019)
Genre: Abusive Relationships, Gun Violence, M/M, Regency, Romantic Poets - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-02
Updated: 2020-09-18
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:48:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26255908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beefmaster/pseuds/Beefmaster
Summary: A bad boyfriend, a shocking discovery, a turn of the knife, a letting go.Or, the story of Thomas's death.
Relationships: George Gordon Byron | Lord Byron/Thomas Thorne
Comments: 15
Kudos: 51





	1. When We Two Parted

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story is much darker than anything I've written before, but not so dark that the typical reader wouldn't enjoy it. That is to say, there is death, and an abusive relationship, and a fatal gunshot wound, but the whole thing is played with enough melodrama that I think it avoids being too dark for a piece of fan fiction. 
> 
> There are real historical figures as characters, but I have played VERY fast and loose with historical facts, places, dates, and personalities. The central problem of writing this fic is that Thomas clearly died in England, but the high profile Romantics (Byron, both Shelleys, Keats) actually spent most of their careers on the Continent, so facts and dates had to be fudged to make it all work. Personally, I blame the writers of Ghosts for loosely implying that Byron shot Thomas when that doesn't make a lot of sense historically.
> 
> I have also played pretty fast and loose with what I call the characters. I wanted to go by Jane Austen's conventions, but she actually has a VERY complicated system of when she uses characters first names and when she uses last names, and to replicate it would benefit no one. So instead, I made choices character by character: Thomas Thorne is Thomas because that's his name on the show, George Gordon Byron is Byron because his first name is rarely used when discussing him these days, Mary Shelley is Mary because Shelley isn't really _her_ name, it's her married name, and Percy Shelley is Shelley because it is his name. 
> 
> Many thanks to my beta, highinfibre, whose keen eye for prose helped shape this story into what it is.
> 
> Thanks also to succulentfather and LonelyIslandDaydreamer, whose fics about Thomas and Byron inspired this one.

Thomas groans softly as he turns over onto his back. He finds himself gravitating towards the warm spot beside him. A strong hand on his shoulder stills him.

“Stop, you move too much,” Byron whispers into his ear. “I have not yet consented to wake.”

Thomas smiles and turns over anyway, facing Byron.

“My dear George, the sun has risen,” he insists. 

Byron frowns, and shuts his eyes tighter. His face softens as Thomas runs a finger along his crow’s feet. Byron moans softly.

Thomas slips out of bed, and treads quietly toward the basin on the dresser, careful not to awaken Byron again. He splashes his face, rinsing the sleep from his eyes. Staring in the mirror, he pulls down the collar of his nightshirt to reveal the purpling bite mark Byron had left the night before on his collarbone. He runs his finger over it gently.  _ George was magnificent last night,  _ Thomas thinks. He was the perfect mixture of tender and fierce, of loving and ferocious. Afterwards, he had held Thomas close, tracing patterns on his back and whispering a variety of sweet things that Thomas took to mean “I love you.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Thomas catches sight of a stack of papers on Byron’s desk. He smiles.  _ George’s latest work _ , he thinks,  _ perhaps he’s written a love poem for me.  _ He sneaks a look in the mirror at the bed behind him. Byron is still asleep, sheets clutched tightly to his chest. Quietly, Thomas removes the stack of paper from the desk and begins to read through them. 

The papers are, in fact, Byron’s latest work, a series of lyric poems. They are still in early drafts, if the furious edits scribbled in the margins are anything to go by. Thomas shuffles through the pages, hoping to find something that might be about him. He is about the set the papers down, disappointed, when his eyes alight upon a familiar phrase: 

“It cannot quit its place of birth,

It will not live in other earth.”

Thomas had written that line almost exactly in a poem he had shared with Byron only weeks ago.  _ Odd,  _ Thomas thinks.  _ Surely ‘twas accidental. My verse must have burrowed so deeply in his brain that George could not disentangle it from his own.  _ Thomas reads on.

“In his hand is my heart and my hope”

_ Hmm.  _ Just a few nights ago, Thomas had recited a verse of his own to Byron, telling him “In your hand is my heart and my hope.” Thomas had written the poem in an effort to win Byron back after finding him once again in the bed of Lady Caroline Lamb. Byron had kissed his knuckles so sweetly, promising his unwavering fidelity to him.  _ Surely George had not forgotten that? _

As Thomas reads, he can feel his heart rise in his throat. Phrase after phrase he recognizes from his own verse. Never more than two lines at a time, but still, the words were lifted straight from Thomas’ own work. The twisting, swirling emotions deep in his own heart reach a fever pitch just as he feels a pair of strong arms wrap around him. 

“Stealing a look?” Byron murmurs in his ear. He sucks Thomas’s earlobe into his mouth in the way that Thomas has always adored.

“George,” he breathes, leaning back against Byron’s solid chest. 

“What do you think? I do hope I have lived up to your towering standards.”

“George, my heart,” Thomas says, “I believe you have pilfered my verse.”

Thomas feels Byron’s arms go rigid, tightening just enough to be painful.

“Surely, my sweet Thomas,” he says slowly, “you must be mistaken.”

“I am not!” Thomas says hotly. He points to a line on the page. “Right here, do you see? ‘Yet did I love thee to the last, as fervently as thou.’ I wrote that. This is from the poem I gave you for your birthday last year, remember?”

“A coincidence,” Byron says quickly. “Simply a case of convergent minds.” Byron holds him so tightly Thomas thinks he might be crushed.

“But it’s not the only one,” Thomas insists. “This line here, I wrote it, and this bit, well, it’s not exactly what I wrote, but I believe it’s only a few words off, and on this page-”

“Thomas,” Byron interrupts sharply. “Have you considered the possibility that _ you _ stole  _ my _ verse?” He reaches up to brush back a curl from Thomas’s face, stroking his temple over and over again. Thomas’s skin burns at the touch. 

“But- but- but I’ve never read this before!” Thomas sputters. “You keep your work secret, how could I have?”

“Simple. I often speak aloud as I write, you could have easily overheard me, and later, mistaken the memory for your own thought.” Byron’s hand continues to rake through Thomas’s hair, tugging at the roots. 

“It’s possible,” Thomas concedes. It just doesn’t  _ seem _ right, though. A line or two could be explained in this manner, surely, but if Byron is telling the truth, Thomas had stolen half of his verse without so much as a passing suspicion of what he had done.

“Oh Thomas, you beautiful thing.” Byron brings his other hand up to gently encircle Thomas’ throat. Thomas gasps, and drops the papers in surprise. “I suppose I should be terribly upset with you. You have the gall to not only steal my work, but then accuse me of the same crime.” His fingers pulse once, gripping Thomas’s throat tighter. “Still, I shall be merciful. Consider the whole affair forgiven.”

“Thank you, George,” Thomas rasps. “I’m so sorry.” 

“That’s quite alright.” Byron releases Thomas’s throat. Thomas would have collapsed to the floor if Byron hadn’t caught him by the waist. He spins Thomas around in his arms to face him. “We shall speak of it no more.” Thomas wraps his arms around Byron’s neck and buries his head in Byron’s shoulder. It rattles him greatly when Byron behaves this way. He breathes deeply, inhaling Byron’s scent. He needs proof of Byron’s solidity, that he is really holding him, that he really loves him. 

“Oh Thomas, what would you do without me?”

Thomas shakes his head. He doesn’t know; sometimes he feels as though the earth would swallow him up without Byron.

“Come back to bed with me,” Byron whispers in his ear. Thomas nods shakily.

“Yes, my love.”

“Mrs. Shelley,” Thomas says, with a short nod, “always a pleasure to see you.”

“And you, Mr. Thorne,” Mary replies, looking up from her book. “I trust you are enjoying your stay here in our home?” 

“Very much so. You have a beautiful estate.” Thomas sits in a chair opposite Mary. 

“Very good.” Mary returns to her book. Thomas taps his fingers nervously along the arms of the chair. Mary lowers her book again. “Is there something I can help you with, Mr. Thorne?”

“No, no, please, don’t let me interrupt your reading.”

“Thank you.” 

“Well…”

“Yes, Mr. Thorne?”

“It is about our friend Lord Byron.”

Mary places a bookmark in her book and puts it on the table. “Yes?”

“We had a bit of an argument this morning. A disagreement, really. Byron had left a few pages of his work on his desk, so I read a few passages, and when I did, I noticed a striking similarity between his work and mine own.”

“Similarity?”

“Yes, lines, phrases, that seemed to be lifted directly from poems I had written and shared with Lord Byron.”

“You accused him of stealing from you?”

“I did. But he countered I had stolen from him. He says I must have overheard him mumbling to himself as he worked, and incorporated it into my own writing.”

“Hmm.” Mary frowns thoughtfully.

“Do you think it possible? That I stole his work without meaning to?”

“It’s possible, although it seems unlikely.” Mary bites her lip. “Mr. Thorne, I am aware of the nature of your relationship with Lord Byron.” 

“Oh, yes. I assumed you were all aware.”

“Quite. Mr. Thorne, I have known Lord Byron for some time now, and the way he treats those he loves can be, at times, cruel.”

Thomas stiffens. “Mrs. Shelley, I assure you Lord Byron has been nothing but kind and loving to me. He is a paragon of virtue in every way.”

“I’m sure. I just wanted to make sure you are aware of his reputation. I would hate for you to do anything that would invoke his ire.”

“Lord Byron would never hurt me,” Thomas insists, but even as he says it he isn’t so sure.

That evening, Thomas is searching the library for a book when Byron approaches him.

“Thorne.”

Thomas’s blood turns to ice. Byron only addressed him by his last name when he was well and truly cross. He turns around slowly to face him. Byron is standing stiffly, arms behind his back in a formal pose.

“Yes, my dear George?” 

“I heard from Shelley that you and Mrs. Shelley had a talk this afternoon.”

Thomas swallows. “Yes, we did. It was quite pleasant.”

Byron takes a step closer. “I’m sure it was. From what I hear, you accused me _again_ of stealing your verse.”

Thomas backs up a step, toward the shelf. “No! No, my love- well, yes, but it’s not as simple as that, I was merely asking-”

Another step forward. “ _ After _ we had already put the matter to rest.”

Thomas steps back again, almost tripping over himself. “I know we had, but you must understand-”

Another step forward. “I am a patient man, Thorne. But even my patience is worn thin by your impudence.”

There is nowhere left for Thomas to go, his back against the bookshelf. “I didn’t mean- I simply sought counsel on the situation-”

Byron takes a final step closer, almost knocking Thomas over. Thomas flails his arms in search of purchase on the shelves behind him, sending a few books flying.

“You know, you’re not the young, pretty, foolhardy thing you once were. You don’t flatter yourself by acting like one.” Byron’s face is mere inches from Thomas now; Thomas can smell the sourness of his breath.

“George-” Thomas begins, then gasps as he feels something cold and hard press into his stomach. He looks down to see Byron has jammed a pistol between his ribs. “George, please!” Tears well up in his eyes, threatening to fall.

“Personally, I don’t see why I shouldn’t pull the trigger,” Byron sneers, “and paint this entire library with your beautiful red blood. Then I could be done with your useless snivelling once and for all.” 

The tears are falling freely now, as Thomas begins to blubber. “George, please, my dear man, I’ll do anything, I love you, I swear I will.” Thomas sobs loudly.

Byron’s face softens. “Oh, my love,” he says, placing the gun on one of the shelves beside Thomas. “Oh, my sweet Thomas.” He wraps one arm around Thomas’s waist, and cups his face with the other. “My sweet man, don’t cry. Oh, I’m sorry, I’m sorry love, I only meant to scare you.” Byron kisses Thomas’s cheeks, shushing him as he goes. 

Thomas wraps his arms around Byron’s shoulders as he continues to cry. He knows Byron wouldn’t hurt him, the man had never done anything this cruel. Certainly, he had uttered a wounding word, or gripped Thomas’s wrist too tightly, but never before had he resorted to gunpowder. It’s only his passion getting the best of him.  _ And isn’t that passion the reason I love him?  _

Still, the cold of the metal had frightened him terribly. 

“Oh, I love you so dearly, Thomas. And I know you would never do anything that would hurt me, would you?” 

Thomas shakes his head. 

“Of course not. You would never vilify me to the press as a plagiarist. You’re too good, too kind.” 

Thomas draws in a ragged breath as he composes himself. “I’m so sorry George, I never meant to hurt you. I only told Mrs. Shelley because I thought she would never tell anyone else.”

“I know, I know.” Byron pets Thomas’s hair soothingly. Thomas can’t help but lean into the touch. “Why don’t you go and wash your face? Comport yourself in preparation for dinner, hm?”

Thomas nods. He kisses Byron briefly on the lips, before extricating himself from his arms and making his way toward the stairs.  _ How silly I’ve been,  _ he thinks,  _ how silly I’ve been to make my dear George so angry. Surely there must be something I can do, something to show him how ardently I- _

Thomas hears a loud  _ bang _ , then very suddenly, he feels a hot, burning sensation rip through his back toward his stomach. He drops to his knees as the burning continues to radiate out from his core. Thomas lets out a sharp, high-pitched wail before collapsing forward, hands pressed against the wound on his stomach.

“Oh Thomas,” comes Byron’s voice behind him. “My sweet, beautiful Thomas.” Thomas feels Byron’s warm hand on his back. “Come here, love.” Thomas is pulled up and turned over, so Byron can cradle him in his arms. 

“Why- but I thought-”

“Shh, my sweet. Rest.” Byron kisses Thomas’s forehead. Thomas shivers. As Byron rocks Thomas back and forth, he recites a poem:

_ And thou art dead, as young and fair _

_ As aught of mortal birth; _

_ And form so soft, and charms so rare, _

_ Too soon returned to Earth! _

The very last thought Thomas has, before closing his eyes forever, is how dreadful it is to hear his own poetry recited back to him.


	2. Darkness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thomas dies; he discovers he is not alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bit of a tone-shift in this chapter, but the world of the dead is different than the world of the living.
> 
> Content warning for... inappropriate and excessive handling of a human corpse? IDK how else to say it.
> 
> Unbeta'ed due to my own impatience.
> 
> Short chapter, the next one will be much longer!

As it turns out, Thomas had not closed his eyes forever. In fact, he opens them again only moments later. When he does, he finds that everything is slightly off. He’s still looking at Byron, but now instead of looking up, he’s looking down at him. He’s also looking at himself. At least, he thinks he’s looking at himself. He’s staring at a mop of dark curly hair, which is attached to a head, which is attached to a body, cradled in Byron’s arms. Which is exactly the position Thomas last remembers being in. 

Speaking of positions, Thomas is standing up. The Thomas that is Thomas, that is, not the Thomas that is currently cradled in Byron’s arms.  _ That _ Thomas is currently cradled in Byron’s arms. The situation is odd, because Thomas has no memory of standing up. Still, in the grand scheme of things, it seems a small problem, considering that Thomas also has no memory of having two bodies.

Actually, Thomas isn’t entirely sure he has  _ one _ body. He looks down to check. He sees his feet (or rather, his shoes, which he assumes contain feet), his legs (or rather, his trousers, which he assumes contain legs), and his hands (which fortunately are bare and thus can be confirmed as existing). He reaches up with aforementioned hands to feel his face, which does, in fact, exist as well.

“Hallo,” calls a woman’s voice behind him.

Thomas turns around quickly to reveal four people he’s never seen before: a woman in an out of style dress, a man holding on to his neck, a woman with soot all over her face, and what appears to be a caveman. 

“I’m Kitty,” says the woman who spoke before, the wearer of the out of date dress.

“Who are you?” Thomas asks.

“I’m Kitty,” Kitty repeats, disappointed.

“Oh, for the love of- we’re ghosts,” says the man holding his neck, “and you are too.”

“What? No, no, I’m alive,” says Thomas.

“Really?” asks the caveman, tilting his head towards Thomas’s stomach.

Thomas looks down to see the large, round, exit wound below his heart. Curiously, it isn’t bleeding anymore.

“Oh, good heavens!” Thomas shouts. “I’ve been shot!” He whips around to face Byron, who is still kneeling on the floor. “Oh my love, I know you didn’t mean to hurt me,” he coos. 

“Actually, I thinks he dids,” says the soot-faced woman.

Thomas kneels down next to Byron and attempts to rest a hand on his shoulder. His hand goes right through, resulting in a disgusting itchy feeling that goes all the way down to his bones. He pulls his hand away quickly.

“No touchy!” says the caveman. “Feels bad. Like bug bite all over.”

Thomas ignores him in favor of hovering his hand directly over Byron’s back, pretending to soothe him.

“Oh George, don’t cry,” he says, “I shall wait for you forever on the other side.”

But Byron isn’t crying. He’s staring at Thomas’s (not the Thomas Thomas, the other Thomas) face with a morbid sort of fascination. He thumbs at Thomas’s lower lip (again, the Thomas who is- oh, you get it), pulling it down to reveal his teeth.

“Beautiful man,” he murmurs.

Suddenly, Mary appears in the doorway, out of breath. “Byron, I thought I heard a shot, are you alright?” she says, resting a hand on her knee. “I came as quick as I- oh good Lord.” Mary turns away, shielding her eyes with the back of her hand. 

“He’s dead,” Byron says, without looking up from his inspection of Thomas’s teeth. “I shot him.”

“He seems to really like your teeth,” says the soot-faced woman. “I’ll takes a gander.” She attempts to open (ghost) Thomas’s mouth. He pushes her away.

“Oh, Byron,” Mary says, “you rotten thing.” 

“He was going to ruin me,” Byron says, finally looking up. “I had no choice. Eventually, love takes all things.” 

Mary furrows her brow. “We’ll have to make it look like an accident. Perhaps you two were hunting. Come, follow me.”

Byron holds Thomas’s body close to his chest as he stands and follows Mary out of the library. Mary turns back to him.

“Not a word of this to Percy,” she says. “As far as he knows, it really was an accident.” 

Byron nods, and they both run from the room.

“An accident?” Thomas says, chasing after them. “No, no, it was a crime of passion! He loves me!” The other ghosts follow him.

“Slow down!” calls Kitty. “I have short legs and a long dress.”

“We’ll take him to the woods,” Mary says, as she navigates them out of the house. “He’ll be a bit suspicious, but he’ll want to believe.”

“He doesn’t have a coat,” Byron protests.

“It’s too late now, unless you wish to shoot him again.” Mary leads Byron, both Thomases, and the ghosts to a wooded area behind the house. “Alright, what else? The gun!”

“It’s still in the library,” Byron says. 

“Right, I’ll go get it. We’ll need another gun for Thomas too, if you’ve been hunting.” Mary turns and runs back to the house, leaving Byron alone with the ghosts.

“That woman can really run,” says the man with his hands on his neck. Thomas turns around to find that the man’s hands are no longer on his neck, but rather are carrying his head.

“Oh, Heavens,” Thomas says, hand to his chest.

“What? Oh, this? Yeah, it comes loose sometimes. Got to be vigilant.”

“Oh, my dear Thomas,” Byron says. “What have you done?” He is back on the ground again, still holding Thomas’s corpse. Thomas turns away from the man with a detached head to sit next to Byron.

“It’s alright George,” he whispers. “It’ll be alright. I’ve got you.”

“Goodbye, my sweet.” Byron leans down to press a chaste kiss to Thomas’s mouth.

“Ew,” says the caveman.

“Oh, that not be holy,” says the soot-faced woman.

“I think it’s romantic,” says Kitty. “Oh wait, he’s dead, isn’t he?”

Thomas watches as Byron lays his corpse out, then turns him over so his face is in the dirt. Byron arranges the limbs so it really does look like he fell down dead. 

“Sleep, blessed one,” he murmurs.

Thomas feels something wet on his chin. He touches his face, and discovers tears have been pouring down it.

“Come now,” says the soot-faced woman gently. She takes Thomas’s hand, pulling him up. “Me thinks it’s best we goes inside.”

Thomas nods mutely, and allows the other four ghosts to lead him back to the house. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! If you want totalk about how Thomas's hair is shorter is the season 2 promo pics (bad) but they seem to have caked less makeup on Mathew Baynton's face (good), hit me up at Ladiesloveduranduran on Tumblr.


	3. So We’ll Go No More A Roving

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thomas learns to move on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The exciting conclusion! Once again, I have played very fast and loose with historical fact.
> 
> Unbeta'd, but I did get some help from the lovely people over at the Ghiscord to translate this work into British English

For the next year, Thomas goes through what Robin calls “the stalking time.” Apparently, every ghost goes through it: a period spent moping about, mourning your past life and following the living members of the house around like a hunter stalking prey. Most ghosts, according to Robin, only experience the stalking time for a few months, but Thomas has never been one to do things in half measures. A life as rich and great as his, Thomas figures, will require at least a decade of stalking time to be mourned properly. 

Byron visits the Shelleys on occasion. When he does, Thomas stalks him most closely. He stands over his shoulder as he writes, circles the table as he eats, sits next to the tub as he bathes. He knows the other ghosts must think him pitiful, but he doesn’t care. Even when he gets hit in the face by an errant bread crumb or splashed with dirty bath water, Thomas stays resolutely by his side.

About a year after Thomas’s death, the Shelleys host some of their closest literary friends: Keats, Byron, and Byron’s new doctor friend, John Polidori. Thomas, as always, trails Byron from his carriage to his room. Thomas lays out on the bed, watching as Byron splashes water on his face.

“Oh George,” Thomas moans, “If only you would kill yourself. Then we could once again be joined, your heart wrapped around mine for all eternity.”

“Don’t know why you’d want that codpiece around here,” says Humphrey’s head. 

“Humphrey!” Thomas says with a start. “I did not know you were here.” Thomas looks around. “Where are you, exactly?”

“I’m down here, by the desk,” Humphrey says. “Anyway, I can hardly see why you’re always pining for him. He’s a miserable cad, and he wasn’t very nice to you, either.”

Thomas scoffs. “George was nothing but kind to me.” Byron dries his face and walks out the door. Thomas is about to follow him, but he can’t help but ask Humphrey: “How- how was he unkind to me?” 

“Oh, you know, he insulted you, mostly when you weren’t there.”

“What did he say?”

“Oh, loads of things. What was a good one? Oh, he said you wrote prose like a wolf devours a deer carcass; with enthusiasm, but no art, leaving anyone who viewed it feeling sick.” Humphrey chuckles. “That was a pretty good one. Say, would you mind bringing me back to the old body?” he adds, but Thomas is already gone.

 _My prose!_ Thomas thinks, as he stomps through the house. _Certainly, my prose couldn’t hold a candle to my verse, but George knew of my sensitivities on the matter! He told me my prose was charming, that I had a unique and compelling voice!_ To think that Byron had lied to him, and then insulted him to others, is painful beyond measure. Thomas paces around the first floor, trying to calm himself down. 

_But surely he had a reason,_ Thomas thinks, eventually. _I must have made him cross that day. He was just upset._ The thought mollifies him somewhat, and he descends the stairs, ready to rejoin the party. 

Downstairs, Mary (Shelley), Percy Shelley, and John Keats are discussing a novel, while Mary (the ghost), Kitty, and Robin pretend to join them.

“Seems to me,” says Mary (the ghost), “the cards game is a symbol of the games Mary Crawfords be playing.”

“I like Julia,” Kitty says. “That’s my sister’s name.”

Thomas ignores them in favor of finding Byron. He finds him in the library, talking with a young man who must be John Polidori, their heads close together. Thomas’s face goes hot. _George always did love young men,_ Thomas thinks. Polidori couldn’t be more than 20.

“I believe she favors me,” Polidori says, “but not enough. And she’s so beautiful, Byron, I am hardly her only suitor.” 

“She takes you for granted,” Byron says.

“Perhaps.”

Byron pats the back of Polidori’s hand. “That’s a problem easily solved, my boy. You need to make her need you, need your approval. You say that she has many suitors, but you must convince her this is not the case. Convince her that only you could possibly love her, that she is useless without you.”

Polidori frowns. “That seems cruel, my lord.”

“Perhaps, but it works. I have used it to great effect many times. Besides, would it not be crueler to deprive her of your company?”

Polidori says something in response, but Thomas doesn’t hear. He is turning Byron’s words over in his head. Could it be possible? No, it couldn’t, Byron would never- but still it did seem- but surely Thomas was mistaken- and yet, all the evidence pointed to the same thing: that Byron had used these same tactics on Thomas. How many times had Byron told Thomas that he was old and washed up, and that only _he_ could find him beautiful? How many times had Byron reminded him that only _he_ could put up Thomas’s foolishness, his melodrama and impertinence? Thomas remembers the night he met Byron. He had spent the first part of the night flirting with a charming young woman from Swindon, a Miss Sylvia Vickers, and when Byron first approached him, it was to inform him of the ghastly things Miss Vickers had been saying about him. Thomas never saw Miss Vickers again, but he did end the evening on his knees in Byron’s bedroom.

Thomas had always looked back on their meeting so fondly. He remembers how the young, beautiful, Lord Byron had swept him off his feet, how every woman and man at the party had their eyes on Byron, but Byron only had eyes for him. But now the memory feels sour. _Had Miss Vickers insulted me at all,_ he wonders, _or was that just an invention?_

Thomas is jolted out of his reverie by someone colliding with him from behind. He turns around to see Humphrey’s headless body tottering around. As annoyed as he is, the collision seems to have knocked Thomas to his senses. _How foolish of me,_ he thinks. _George is right, I am prone to melodrama. I must endeavor to remember: George loves me, he would never hurt me._

“Alright, let’s go find your mate,” Thomas says to Humphrey’s body. He pushes him up the stairs, away from Byron and Polidori.

Thomas stays away from Byron for a few hours after that. Clearly, the proximity isn’t good for Thomas: he’s starting to feel something close to resentment for Byron, and that simply won’t do. Instead, he watches a chess game between Shelley and Keats, and explains the rules to a very excited Robin. The afternoon passes pleasantly that way, until he sees Mary (Shelley) walk by carrying a familiar leatherbound book. He leaps up to follow her. She makes her way to the library, where Byron and Polidori are still engaged in intense conversation.

“Dr. Polidori,” Mary says, “do you mind if I speak with Lord Byron privately?”

“Not at all,” Polidori says, jumping to his feet. 

“We’ll talk again later John,” Byron says. Polidori blushes, and runs from the room.

“I have something for you,” Mary tells Byron. “The chambermaid found it the other day.” She holds out the journal. “I believe it belonged to Mr. Thorne.”

Thomas gasps. Mary was right, it did belong to him. His journal, where he wrote down his most intimate thoughts, his personal philosophies and treatises on love. 

“Take it, my sweet,” Thomas says. “It is my gift to you.”

Byron takes the journal from Mary, flipping through it. “Is it his poetry?” he asks.

“No, I believe it’s mostly personal in nature. Thoughts, feelings, that sort of thing,” Mary says. “There’s a lot about you.”

“Proof of my love for you,” Thomas adds.

Byron takes another second to look at the journal, then hands it back to Mary. “No thank you. I hardly need more clutter.”

Mary nods. “Alright, that’s fine.” She sets the journal down on a small table. “I was going to start a game of backgammon, if you’d care to join?”

“I’d be delighted,” Byron says. They leave the library, leaving Thomas frozen in place. He can’t move, he can’t think, all he can do is stare at the place Byron once stood, his jaw open.

He must have stood there for a while, because eventually Kitty comes to find him.

“Thomas?” she says, making her way carefully into the library. “You disappeared. Is everything alright?”

“No, it isn’t!” Thomas says, in a voice much more high-pitched than he intended it to be. “Everything is absolutely horrible!”

“Oh, I’m sorry. Is it to do with Byron?”

“Of course it’s to do with Byron! How could it not have to do with that venomous, cowardly little man who didn’t have the decency to look me in the eyes as he shot me!” Thomas gasps. He feels like he’s only half-controlling the words that come out of his mouth.

“Thomas!” Kitty exclaims, “I thought you loved him.”

“I did. But he treated me most cruelly. He lied to me, he insulted me, he manipulated me, and he-” Thomas’s voice breaks. “He didn’t care that I loved him.”

“Oh Thomas,” Kitty says. She goes to comfort Thomas, but he turns away dramatically.

“I filled an entire journal with my love for him, and he doesn’t even care to possess it. He has moved on to his next victim, that pretty young doctor. I can only hope he is less foolish than I.”

“Dr. Polidori is handsome, isn’t he?” Kitty says thoughtfully.

“Not helpful, Kitty.”

“No, I’m sorry, I suppose it’s not. Would you like to watch the backgammon with me?”

“No, I would not! I have no interest in watching that horrendous _beast_ of a man play a game of Backgammon! Besides, he cheats, you know.”

“Really?” Kitty sits on the window seat, patting the space beside her. “He sounds awful. Tell me more.”

“Well, his curls aren’t natural, you know.”

“Really?”

“Yes. He wears curl papers in his hair at night. And he knows nothing about geography. He once asked me why he couldn’t just take a carriage to France.”

They spent the rest of the afternoon like that, Thomas telling Kitty of the awful things Byron had done, and Kitty laughing and sighing in response. He told her of the pets Byron kept, and how his home always smelled of wet dog. He told her about the skulls that lined Byron’s dining room, how Byron had even had some of them turned into goblets. He told her about the unkind words, the lies, the bruises left from gripping his arm too tightly. He told her absolutely everything, until he was almost tired from talking.

A few hours in, Robin comes into the library.

“Mister Byron says he going to do poem,” he says. “Thomas, you come watch?”

Thomas shakes his head. “No, I think I’m going to stay right here.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for coming! If you'd like to discuss whether or not Lord Byron and John Polidori slept together, hit me up on Tumblr and Discord at ladiesloveduranduran, or publish an academic paper on the matter and I'll find you.
> 
> Didn't feel like doing formal annotations, but for those wondering, the book they are discussing is Mansfield Park by Jane Austen.


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